The Weight of Our Sky

A music loving teen with OCD does everything she can to find her way back to her mother during the historic race riots in 1969 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in this heart-pounding literary debut.

Melati Ahmad looks like your typical movie-going, Beatles-obsessed sixteen-year-old. Unlike most other sixteen-year-olds though, Mel also believes that she harbors a djinn inside her, one who threatens her with horrific images of her mother's death unless she adheres to an elaborate ritual of counting and tapping to keep him satisfied.

A trip to the movies after school turns into a nightmare when the city erupts into violent race riots between the Chinese and the Malay. When gangsters come into the theater and hold movie-goers hostage, Mel, a Malay, is saved by a Chinese woman, but has to leave her best friend behind to die.

On their journey through town, Mel sees for herself the devastation caused by the riots. In her village, a neighbor tells her that her mother, a nurse, was called in to help with the many bodies piling up at the hospital. Mel must survive on her own, with the help of a few kind strangers, until she finds her mother. But the djinn in her mind threatens her ability to cope.

Binding Type: Hardcover
Publisher: Salaam Reads / Simon & Schuster Books for You
Published: 02/05/2019
ISBN: 9781534426085
Pages: 288
Weight: 0.80lbs
Size: 8.40h x 5.90w x 1.30d

Review Citations: Bulletin of Ctr for Child Bks 02/01/2019
Booklist 12/01/2018 pg. 58
Publishers Weekly 11/26/2018
Kirkus Reviews 12/15/2018 pg. 160
School Library Journal 05/01/2019 pg. 62
Shelf Awareness 02/15/2019
Hornbook Guide to Children 07/01/2019 - Recommended, Satisfactory